No emotions crossed his features when he spoke, and his gaze remained pinned. Yet, I remember the words he uttered to Luc only a few days ago. Gabriel declared he was close to finding a stone. Surely, he meant a bloodstone.Theirstone. There’s only one reason I can think of for finding their stone. He wants to cast magic, or he knows someone who wishes to.
“Do you not wish for it?” Even as I speak, I think of my kyanite necklace. Always cold against my skin. Always incapable of heightening anything.
“I don’t waste my thoughts on things I’m incapable of changing or doing,” he says in a plain voice.
I continue, my tone light, friendly. “I am from a tribe that has great magic, but I’m unable to create a single spell.”
His stare flickers over me for several beats. “You are a Kyanite, yet the gods marked your body with a serpent.”
My breath stutters at the truth behind his statement. It’s true. The inside of my right wrist bears the brand of a serpent, the same kind these Bloodstone warriors wear, etched into their weapon belts, their bracers, and their surcoats.
Unconsciously, my fingers trace the mark. It looks just like theirs. It has the same details, the same markings. The same hissing serpent with its faint detail of scales.
“I don’t know why the high gods gave me this,” I say in a raw voice.
“They need no reason. They cursed you by suppressing your magic and branding you with the mark of the people you hate.” No bitterness fringes his words, yet they bear the weight of a hundred bricks.
“I don’t hate anyone.” Somehow, I speak without allowing my flame to spark in my eyes.
Gabriel rises and sets his goblet on a log. “Come. You will share my tent tonight.”
Share his tent?
Like the first night, or does he mean to make me his wife in more than name?
Warmth nestles in my belly. It shouldn’t be there.
Maybe it has simply been too long. I miss intimacy, stolen moments, glances, kissing.
Is it wrong to want that with Gabriel?
The longer he rode behind me earlier, the more I thought about those things. After all, he wasn’t speaking. It gave me far too long to think, to feel, to wonder why my stomach didn’t tighten or my skin crawl at his nearness.
I even thought about how perfectly I sat in front of him. His chin brushed against my hair. His arms and thighs cradled me.
The men exchange knowing looks before pretending to eat instead of watching as I stand, dust off my surcoat, and follow Gabriel.
The moment we enter the same tent as the night before, he pours a goblet of wine. “I haven’t changed my mind about not bedding you.” He takes a drink and continues. “But it’s important people think we are intimate.”
“Why?” It’s a fair question and one I need to know so I may understand him better. “I am a Kyanite. Why should your people care if you bed me or not?”
“Precisely. You’re a Kyanite, and my people will never accept you if they don’t think I care about you.”
“Do you want them to accept me?”
“Yes, or they will condemn you.” He taps his thumb against the edge of his goblet. “Trust me, you never want the Bloodstone people to condemn you.”
Unease prickles against my skin. “What does condemnation look like?”
“Death,” he says, his word choice far too blunt.
“That is rather harsh.”
“Is it?” He runs a hand across his forehead as if attempting to ease the tension.
“I have no wish to be your enemy, or your people’s enemy.” At least, not yet. When I’m finished here, I’ll bealltheir enemies.
“Good. Then, we’ll let them believe you and I are intimate.”
